Editorials
A Decade On, ‘Dead Space 2’ Remains Its Generation’s Top Horror Title
Visceral’s Dead Space was a match made in survival horror heaven. Combining elements of John Carpenter’s The Thing and Paul WS Anderson’s Event Horizon, and putting it all into a video game made for some truly entertaining (and horrifying) moments for PS3 and Xbox 360 fans. It was no surprise that EA and Visceral got right to work on the sequel after Dead Space‘s critical acclaim. The resulting Dead Space 2 not only gave us more horror, but ultimately ended up as one of the scariest titles of the generation.
Three years after the events of the first game, engineer Isaac Clarke awakens with no memory of these three years on a space station called The Sprawl. It turns out that the Necromorphs are back, and have infested the space station. Complicating matters is the fact that Isaac is suffering from progressively worsening hallucinations. Isaac must now meet up with a woman named Daina Le Guin, who promises a cure for the hallucinations, as well as a rescue from the Necromorphs.
Visceral clearly knew what they were doing with Dead Space 2. The game hits the ground running almost immediately, relegating the recap for those who “walked in late” to a cutscene, in favour of throwing players into the action. The result is some of the most intense (and horrifying) opening 10 minutes to a game in recent memory. When the first tutorial message is to remind you that ‘x’ is to run, you get the idea of what’s in store for you. Sure, you’re being led around in a fairly obvious way at the start. But when people around you are either slitting their throats or being killed by Necromorphs, it’s probably best to have some guidance.
It’s been said that much like James Cameron’s Aliens, Dead Space 2 built upon its predecessor in terms of horror as well as action, and it’s easy to see why. In addition to the tension-filled start of the game, Dead Space 2 offered players more firepower, more action sequences, and of course, more horrific sights and sounds. The team went so far as to research photos of victims of car crashes and war to get the look of the gore they desired for the Necromorphs and Isaac’s numerous deaths. The results speak for themselves. Visceral even went further this time, adding new Necromorph enemies to include children (The Pack) and even explosive babies (the Crawlers), which is horrific on several levels. For added fun, you could even pick up the Crawlers via Kinesis and throw them like grenades.
Obviously, the gory scenes weren’t the only horror of Dead Space 2. The mental horrors and anguish of Isaac’s hallucinations were on full display, again calling back to what film fans experienced in Event Horizon. Adding to that is the guilt that Isaac feels not only for what transpired in the Ishimura incident, but also the fate of his girlfriend, Nicole Brennan. After all, Isaac was the one who pushed Nicole to accept a position on the doomed spaceship.
Of course, Nicole (or rather, the hallucination of Nicole) won’t let Isaac forget this, and results in torment for the player. You’re never quite sure what will transpire when her specter shows up. Will it be something as benign as a taunt, something that results in Isaac almost killing himself, or being bombarded with a torrent of Necromorphs? Despite being a cliché, Nicole as a vehicle for Isaac’s guilt is a perfect way to get some psychological horror in the game.
All of this is brought home even more by Visceral’s decision to give Isaac a voice. Gone is the largely silent protagonist, bereft of a true personality. Gunnar Wright’s portrayal of Isaac gives us a more complete character. One with emotions and a moral compass. It just makes the events of the game that much more palpable.
Dead Space 2 didn’t see many changes gameplay-wise from its predecessor, but what was added just made it a more engaging experience. Apart from the four additional weapons (each with alternate firing modes) and new suits, players now had moments like the Subway sequence where Isaac is suspended upside down against waves of Necromorphs, unable to flee or seek cover. Visceral also expanded upon the space sections, now having Isaac freely fly through zero-gravity environments, which added a new dimension (literally) of encountering and dealing with Necromorphs.
This is also where I’m required by law to mention that “stick a needle in your eye” scene. Fulci fans were no doubt enthralled with this one. If you moved the Diagnostic Machine’s needle around too much, or allowed Isaac’s heart rate to get too high, you can guess the result.
Tying all of this together is the atmosphere. Dead Space had it and then some, but the sequel seemed to crank that up even more. From the very beginning, The Sprawl is shown to be massive and oppressive, with dimly-lit corridors and various “traumas” scattered about. The sound design again envelopes the player and raises the tension, all without an over-reliance on jump scares.
Admittedly, Dead Space 2 isn’t perfect, but it’s damn close. Going back to the Aliens comparison with action, one could argue those moments like the aforementioned subway sequence, while terror-inducing, felt more like something you’d find in Uncharted. Then there are the zero-gravity puzzles, which unlike the first game, no longer had you being bombarded by Necromorphs while you solved them, and other zero-gravity moments are turned into glorified obstacle courses while navigating environmental hazards. They don’t quite sour the experience, but taken by themselves, they don’t quite gel with the purer horror of the original.
A more significant complaint can be made about the title’s multiplayer component. Known as Outbreak mode, it pits two four-player teams, one of human Sprawl Security forces, the other a pack of Necromorphs, against each other. It sounded interesting, but ultimately wasn’t up to much. It felt cynically tacked on, and really didn’t capture the same levels of tension found in the single-player campaign. Nevertheless, it didn’t ruin the main draw of the game itself, and was “nice to have”.
But, even with all of these delectables, you have to hand it to EA’s marketing for the proverbial cherry on top. Having a stop-gap with Dead Space Ignition to prime fans was one thing, but the whole “Your Mom Hates Dead Space 2” campaign was a thing of beauty. Sure, it preyed upon the stereotype of uptight moms not liking violent video games (and the fact that the game was already getting a Mature ESRB rating), but it’d be absurd to deny that exists in the first place. Plus, it was just plain fun! Of course, the award-winning campaign ate into the game’s $120 million budget, which brings into focus the downside of Dead Space 2.
Despite rave reviews, Dead Space 2 surprisingly failed at retail. The game shipped two million units in its first week, but ultimately sold only four million copies. While those do sound like good figures, keep in mind that $120 million hole EA had to fill, not to mention Sony and Microsoft taking cuts from the sales on the PS3 and 360. Former Visceral employees have remarked at how there were several factors in the game’s underperformance at retail, with marketing costs being one of them. EA did give Visceral another shot with Dead Space 3, but ultimately, the results were the same. And the discussion of Dead Space 3 is for another time.
Even a decade out, Dead Space 2 still scares and entertains with ease. Everything from the characters to the environments to the gameplay are still top-notch, despite now being out two generations of hardware. And the horror still hits hard on multiple levels, leaving you wanting to experience it again. But with the failure of Dead Space 3 (which, like Resident Evil 6, took on a more action-based approach, and started to veer away from horror), and subsequent dismantling and closure of Visceral, fans can only hope that The Callisto Protocol by Striking Distance Studios (headed by Dead Space creator Glen Schofield) would recapture the horror and fun that Dead Space 2 gave us. But who knows? EA might one day revisit Isaac and the Dead Space universe. Until then, Dead Space 2 can still lay claim to being the go-to for those looking for the best of the series, and one of the best survival horror games of the era.
College kids, strippers and vampires—those were Donald P. Borchers’ only requirements when he approached Richard Wenk about writing and directing a movie for New World Pictures. As requested, Wenk cooked up Vamp (1986), a tailor-made blend of the decade’s teen movie craze as well as its horror boom.
Grim and earnest stories were still very much a part of the ’80s horror landscape, yet Vamp is something of a comedy. One difference between it and, say, Saturday the 14th, though, is the former avoids using schtick. Wenk’s movie proves that horror comedies also don’t have to subtract thrills from their recipes. Of course, it takes a minute before reaching that point; college antics and culture shocks preface this one macabre misadventure.
Vamp‘s initial setup is apt for a typical college-set, sex-driven comedy; to bribe their way into a fraternity house, two pledges (Chris Makepeace, Robert Rusler) go looking for some adult entertainment. Without wasting time on any further exposition, the characters embark on an all-in-one-night trip that quickly detours into terror.
To procure their elusive MacGuffin—a stripper willing to gyrate for some frat boys—Keith (Makepeace) and AJ (Rusler), plus a third wheel named Duncan (Gedee Watanabe), trade the safety of their remote college campus for the seediness of some unnamed city. The setting is recognizably L.A. by day, but as soon as night falls, downtown, along with the characters, slips into a kind of surreal universe. Director of photography Elliot Davis gave this early entry on his prolific résumé an unusual yet distinctive look; that Mario Bava-esque, magenta-green lighting is omnipresent, so much so that it’s almost its own character.
Chris Makepeace and Robert Rusler in Vamp
The faint comparisons to Martin Scorsese’s After Hours are merited, although not just because of Vamp’s distinguishing nighttime aesthetic. Save for the primary characters, the supporting roles in Wenk’s movie are also quite colorful and transactional in their behavior. The difference here, though, is the additional urge to ruin Keith and his friends at every turn. Some of that harm is humorous and tolerable enough, whereas the moment Vamp dishes out its first fatality, it’s abundantly clear how this movie qualifies as horror.
Vamp falls into that category of horror movie that reveals its genre with a scream rather than a series of whispers. The opening scene can function as a hint of what lies ahead—things are not at all what they appear to be—but otherwise, Wenk is more than happy to hold off on the horror. When that time does come, though, it catches the viewer off guard. In addition to the pure shock value is that sudden decision to upend the movie’s foremost feature. Or so it would seem.
If afraid of major spoilage, those new to Vamp would be wise to stop reading here. There’s just no skirting around the fact that the central fellowship in this buddy movie hits a serious snag when AJ is killed. That development causes the story to become more of a “long, bad night” journey for Keith and his romantic interest. So while Wenk scores points for subverting expectations, there is also a touch of sadness in his decision. Because if Vamp does anything well, it’s making the characters likable.
Something that comes easily to Vamp—and other teen horror movies from this same era—is its ability to invent young characters worth caring about, or at the very least, are interesting and not so immediately off-putting. More impressive is how Wenk did all this without actually fleshing out those characters. Still and all, Keith and his kind are a grade above cookie-cutter, and in some cases, aren’t completely devoid of growth.
Grace Jones in Vamp
Vamp appeals with an assorted cast of characters. No two are the same, nor are they operating on the same wavelength. The cinematically extroverted AJ, whose actor conveyed charm and vulnerability in near equal amounts, comes alive when he’s at his most undead. Makepeace then makes the chronically cautious Keith a sympathetic fellow, even as he’s more and more affected by the night’s bizarre events. Meanwhile, Duncan is indeed the designated loser of the whole bunch, but Watanabe still manages to humanize him. As a bonus, the role didn’t require him to pull a Long Duk Dong.
As for Dedee Pfeiffer, she is plain adorable as the mysterious After Dark server nicknamed “Amaretto”. She spends all night fixing her dress strap while at the same time trying to get Keith to remember how he knows her. As their offbeat romance grows, it becomes another highlight of this movie. Whether or not Pfeiffer’s character is really a vampire also creates some welcome tension in the story.
Like a lot of its contemporaries, Vamp went on to become a bit of a cult classic. That current status is determined by several factors, but without a doubt, the casting of Grace Jones is the most considerable. The image of her writhing on that unique-looking chair, a Keith Haring original, springs to mind whenever this movie is brought up.
Chris Makepeace, Billy Drago and Paunita Nichols in Vamp
Prior to that first display of unequivocal horror, local vampire queen Katrina (Jones) took to the stage and delivered a strip show like no other. One would expect nothing less from that renowned model and performance artist. By now reports of Jones’ tardiness on set are no secret, yet it’s also hard to deny her commitment to the part of Katrina. It was, in fact, Jones who took charge of her character’s appearance—on top of Haring painting her body and that now-iconic chair, she had Andy Warhol handle her costuming. And not too many actors could seize a room’s attention without saying a single line of dialogue.
In 2022, Vamp received a retrospective novelization from Encyclopocalypse. This literary union of preexisting source material—Wenk’s original screenplay—and new ideas from author Christian Francis amounts to a more comprehensive visit to the After Dark Club. The basic story there is no different than what’s shown on screen; however, Francis gets creative with the characters’ origins and designs, and he enhances a number of key scenes.
The novelization expands on the urban and social decay of the main setting, and supplies a background for the After Dark Club. Sandy Baron’s character, Katrina’s emcee and familiar, is given ample motivation for sticking around; up until the fiery end, he is loyal to his friend and former business partner “Squeak”, who looks like he was “fed through a combine harvester, and left as nothing more than a heap of mangled remains”. Then there is Billy Drago’s character Snow, the leader of a street gang called The Dragons. His reason for menacing Keith and AJ is more altruistic than in the movie; he and his peers act tough to scare off any potential food for the vampires.
Lisa Lyon in Vamp
If not for all the backstories, Francis’ Vamp would be a hell of a lot shorter. Instead, this tie-in read dives into how AJ met Keith—the orphaned Anthony Joseph hailed from a broken home back in Brooklyn—and how their friendship flourished over the years. Keith’s archership is no longer just an assumed part of his entire being; it’s a confidence-building extracurricular for a boy who got picked on before coming into the protection of the new kid in town. These supplemental, in-depth looks at the protagonists, plus their close connection, are maybe unnecessary. The movie already did a fair and concise job of addressing their platonic intimacy without the need for flashbacks and insights, specifically in that scene where AJ lays it all out as he sacrifices himself.
Where the novelization gets off course is its approach to the minor characters. Intermittently backstorying the likes of Katrina’s indentured servants, Seko (Leila Hee Olsen) and Vlad (Brad Logan), ends up disturbing the flow of the writing. Was it absolutely essential that readers know Vlad was the Grand Duke of the House of Romanov, or how Snow’s accomplice Maven (Paunita Nichols) became so dentally challenged? No, not really. However, one’s mileage with these random biographies may vary.
The novelization is a more substantial experience, but for a movie like Vamp, less is more. And as plentiful as they are, it never simply coasts on its campy charms, either. The character work sits comfortably in that realm between cursory and meticulous, the script is sharper than first realized, and Greg Cannom’s vampire makeup is straightforward yet effective. Most of all, the movie didn’t squander its out-of-the-box concept. Richard Wenk made his vision of a “comic nightmare in which just about anything that can go wrong does” come true, and it is very enjoyable.
You must be logged in to post a comment.